


Lovesick Blues

by hardlyfatal



Series: Four Times Sansa Chased Sandor (And One Time She Didn't) [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Everyone needs a decoupaged clipboard, F/M, High School, Love at First Sight, Margaery & Brienne to the rescue, Sandor's an oblivious doofus, The road to Sandor's heart is paved with eggplant parmigiana, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-29
Updated: 2016-08-29
Packaged: 2018-08-11 17:09:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7900921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hardlyfatal/pseuds/hardlyfatal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For such a perceptive observer of human nature, Sandor sure is oblivious, much to the chagrin of the high school's newest teacher.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lovesick Blues

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AsbestosMouth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsbestosMouth/gifts).



> Title and lyrics listed below are from the Hank Williams song.
> 
> The song mentioned in the story is ["Ain't No Way"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzRA9UzuU8c) by Aretha Franklin. 
> 
> The poem mentioned is a sonnet by Petrarch to his beloved Laura, and it and my (crappy) translation are in the end note.
> 
> This is my first foray into writing in present tense, so if it blows the big one, I apologize.
> 
> Thanks, as always, to Technoelfie for her speedy and constructive beta.

Such a beautiful dream

I hate to think it all over, I've lost my heart it seems

I've grown so used to you somehow

\--Hank Williams, _Lovesick Blues_

. 

Everywhere he looks, there she is.

When he arrives at King’s Landing High School North every morning, she’s just zipping into the parking lot, always managing to find a spot somewhere nearby. Sansa Stark, first year teacher, gets out of her car, one of those tiny Fiats that he has no idea how her giraffe-long legs fold up into, and when her gaze falls on him, her face lights up like a lamp has been switched on behind it.

“Hi, Mr. Clegane!” she says if there are students around, or “Hi, Sandor!” if not. His invariably-grunted non-verbal response never seems to deter her. She shakes out the skirt or dress she wears— never trousers— and then walks inside the building with him.

She cheerfully greets everyone she sees in between keeping a running commentary on today’s weather, yesterday’s weather, tomorrow’s weather, a TV show she’d watched, her dog, what she had for dinner last night, upcoming school events… she never seems to run out of topics, and never seems bothered by his utter lack of response to any of her questions.

When it’s time to split off— he to the sciences wing, where he teaches psychology and sociology, and she to the liberal arts wing where she teaches Romance languages— she sends him off with a perky, “See you at lunch!”

All the teachers have a fluctuating lunch schedule according to day of the week. It’s rare to see the same teachers all the time. But somehow, Sansa has the same exact lunch schedule as Sandor. Her face lights up again when she enters the cafeteria and sees him there at the teachers’ table. She sits opposite him— somehow, the seat opposite him is always free, too— and unpacks the enormous lunch she always brings.

Invariably, there is too much of it for her, and she offers the excess to him: usually a sandwich, a piece of fruit, and cookies, but sometimes she pulls out a giant tupperware container of leftovers and begins dividing it between them before she takes a single bite.

He feels embarrassed, at first, that she clearly thinks his shitty lunches of half-assed sandwiches slapped together 30 seconds before leaving the house or, more commonly, the garbage-quality cafeteria food are so desperately awful that she feels obligated to feed him.

But then he realizes that she is a gourmet cook or some shit like that. Her sandwiches and cookies could come from one of those overpriced hipster coffee shops; her leftovers are restaurant-caliber. He takes one bite of her eggplant parmigiana and almost weeps with joy.

He doesn’t hide that reaction well enough, because she notices and is so delighted that she beams idiotically the entire rest of the day. And then brings some in every single week thereafter. Extra, too, so he can have leftovers of the leftovers, which he eats for dinner for two days.

Then, at the end of the day, Sansa always leaves _just_ as he is, no matter that he always stays late as coach of the football team or just after classes ended. She is director of the student choir, and its practices end just around the same time, she says, so why not walk out together?

And she keeps up another endless stream of conversation as they wend their way through the parking lot to their cars. She discusses what she plans to cook that night for dinner, or any weekend plans she’s contemplating, and asks him what he’ll be doing. His answer is always “nothing” but she just nods solemnly every time and pauses. An odd little silence stretches between them while Sandor wonders what the hell is wrong with the woman. Finally, she takes a deep breath and beams a smile up at him, gets in her tiny car, and drives away.

Even special events garner him the same treatment: no matter where the teachers stand or sit, Sansa finds her way to his side, bestowing another smile upon him before settling in for the assembly or performance or whatever-the-fuck they’ve been forced to attend. She goes to every football game, home _and_ away, and often brings members of her family, and always comes to congratulate him after each victory.

When they lose, however, she brings him cake the next school day. Lemon cake, to be specific, with lemon slices embedded in the top and creamy icing dripping down the sides. She gives it to him in the morning, whispering (though there is no one around to overhear) that he should leave it in his car so no one else feels bad they aren’t also getting cake.

He eats the cake at night, after the eggplant, while wondering, again, what the hell is wrong with her.

Oh, Sandor knows on some level the basis for her bizarrely nice behavior toward him: an overdeveloped sense of gratitude.

On the first day of the school year, some of the troublemaker boys— gangbanger wannabees— hadn’t realized Sansa was a teacher, not a student. She's just out of graduate school, no more than 24, and prettier than any woman he’s ever seen in real life. It was no wonder the boys were interested in her; hell, Sandor would have had to be dead a week before his pulse stopped racing when she got within ten feet of him.

But he, fully aware of his deficits of appearance and personality, never dreams of making any romantic forays toward her. It would be wrong on a half-dozen different levels. And probably send her screaming into the far distance, too.

The boys, however, had no such compunction and surrounded her in the back hallway not far from the locker rooms. It was dark there, one player having decided that light bulbs were for chumps and punched most of them out of their sockets, and smelled like rank, musty jock straps. What she was doing there, he had no idea.

But he heard a feminine voice calling for help and practically teleported to the spot, he moved so fast. There he found a beautiful girl being pawed at by the stupid rich kids who thought they’d be tough if they smoked a lot of pot and dressed like thugs. It didn’t take but ten seconds for Sandor to project them away from her and head-first into some nearby lockers.

“Get the fuck out,” he rasped at them. “Expect repercussions.”

They staggered to their feet and ran off, looking terrified, because everyone knows that Mr. Clegane doesn’t dick around. They’d be suspended or worse by the end of the day.

Sandor turned to the girl, who was sliding slowly down a locker to puddle on the floor, like her legs had turned to water. He picked her up under the arms and sat her on the changing bench.

“Why the fuck are you in the boys’ locker room?” he demanded, inspecting his clothes for signs of the brief scuffle.

“I’m… I was looking for the football coach.”

“You found him.”

“You? Okay, good.” She clamped her hands on the bench seat to either side of her knees, looking like she was holding onto it to keep from tipping off. “I’m Sansa Stark, the new Romance languages teacher. I’ll be directing the student choir, too, and I wanted to ask you if I could do a presentation to the football players to see if they’d like to join.”

“Why the hell would they do that?” She was the new teacher? Shit. With a face and a figure like that, there would be riots in the hallways by the time the school year was up. With a resigned sigh, he noted a spot of blood on his shoulder. Grunting in displeasure, he began to unbutton the shirt.

“It would be a supplementary grade. If they weren’t doing well academically in other subjects, it would boost their GPA so they could meet the grade requirement to keep playing. And it would be a great way for them to…”

Her voice trailed off, sounding breathy. Sandor looked up from where he’d peeled off his shirt to find her staring at him, big blue eyes wide and little pink mouth open in a perfect O. He snagged a spare shirt from his own locker and shrugged into it.

“To what?”

But she just stared at him, like he was the first man she’d ever seen in her life. He knew he was big and fit— he’d played varsity football in high school and college and could have gone pro until an ACL injury killed those dreams— but any attraction a woman felt died a swift death the moment she glimpsed the ruin of his face.

Funny, this Sansa Stark didn’t seem phased by his scars at all. Well, if they didn’t demolish her interest, his personality would finish it off.

“To what?” he repeated, deciding she was just shocked. She looked impossibly young, improbably innocent, and was likely overwhelmed by being accosted by stupid boys and then stripped in front of by a dope who should have known better.

“To what?” she parroted. Her cheeks had a rosy hue, and if he didn't know better, he'd say the expression on her face was… avid. Excited.

His fresh shirt buttoned, tucked in, sleeves rolled up as he liked, he glanced at his watch. Five minutes until homeroom, and the collection of little shits he had to corral for the year— freshmen this time, to his chagrin— was on the far end of the school campus. He’d have to jog to get there in time.

Sandor took her by the elbow and hoisted her to her feet. She went easily enough, but seemed to be moving at three-quarter speed, following him dreamily out of the locker room and down the dark hallway toward the brightly-lit central atrium at its end.

“Football players joining the choir would be a great way for them to what?” he repeated with a patience that was entirely faked as he basically dragged her after him. She smelled like melon or some fruity shit and it was making him think of juicy, ripe things to sink his teeth into.

“To meet girls,” she finished, having to take two steps to every one of his, even on those long legs of hers. “We need tenors and basses. They want dates. It’s a marriage made in heaven.”

“Hunh.” He didn’t care one way or another, as long as it didn’t affect their football performance. “Whatever. Homeroom now.”

He left her in the atrium, blinking in the bright September sunlight pouring through the skylights, and strode off to his classroom. Even from the hallway, he could hear the rowdy behavior of the brats inside. Just before he entered it, however, something compelled him to look back.

She was still standing there, staring at him.

Sandor blew a long breath out of his nose, gathered his composure, and entered the room.

 _She is not for you_ , he thought as he barked at the kids to be quiet and sit down, and that settled the matter.

…or did it?

Thereupon commenced Sansa’s campaign to express her gratitude for his less-than-dashing rescue. Apparently, in the language of her people, this was done with immense amounts of food, but also arts and crafts. He thought perhaps she should have gone into kindergarten teaching, because she to date she’d presented him with:

-a clipboard decoupaged with photos of the football team after past wins, helmets raised in victory;

-a hand-thrown pottery mug glazed in the school’s colors of red and gold;

-and a scarf, again in red and gold, as long and wide as a blanket, which was what he needed in a scarf in order for it to to actually be adequate for his exceptional size.

He did not want to encourage her, and he suspected the scarf was made of hamster yarn or something, but it was both soft and warm and thus effective for keeping him from freezing his ass off during the frigid winter games.

The smile she bestowed upon him, the first time she saw him wearing it, could have melted the snow from the entire football field.

Sandor felt like he should have thanked her for it, but he hadn’t asked her for any of it in the first place. He did, however, ask her if her next gift was going to be a macaroni necklace. The next day, she presented him with an entire foil pan of baked ziti.

“Do I look like I’m starving to death?” he demanded, exasperated, holding his arms out from his sides, though secretly he thought it was funny.

“No,” Sansa replied, her eyes wandering boldly over him in a way that made his feel like his shirt was off again. Her voice sounded odd again, breathy and a little choked. “You don’t look starved at _all_.” She blinked, seeming to recover herself, and continued hastily, “…because I’ve been feeding you for the past six months!”

He rolled his eyes and walked away, but said nothing back, because it's kind of true. He’s never eaten so well in his life, and though he’d die before admitting it, he feels healthier— he has more energy, and is sleeping better— than he had when he was making his own haphazard efforts to feed himself.

Her laughter followed him down the hall.

Now they’re in the year’s home stretch: it is finally May. If they can survive prom, and keep the seniors focused enough through June to graduate, they’ll be able to slope off for their richly-deserved summer break. Sandor almost smiles— almost— to think of those two splendid months away from the school, from the students, from the other teachers…

…from Sansa?

And his joy drains away, just like that.

No happy welcome in the morning, no cheerful company at lunch. No lunch, for that matter. No companionable farewell, no leftovers that night, to be eaten while imagining her making them and wondering what she’s doing at that moment. Instead, he’ll have two months of utter, unbroken solitude.

For the first time in decades, Sandor feels despair, and a terrible loneliness.

That afternoon in the teachers’ lounge, everyone pulls slips of paper out of an actual hat (provided by the principal, Tyrion Lannister) to determine which teachers will supervise the prom. As with all other years, Sandor’s luck sucks and he pulls out a blue slip, indicating he will have the job yet again. He sighs and makes a mental note to get his lone suit dry-cleaned. Not much point in wearing it, since he spends the entire time patrolling the school’s darkest nooks and crannies for students trying to have sex. He’d do better to wear a track suit and sneakers, the better to give chase when they decide they can outrun him (they can’t).

Some whispering to his right catches his attention, and he glances over to see Sansa trade her telltale yellow slip— yellow is for the lucky bastards who are exempt from that year’s torture— for the blue one held by her friend, the English lit teacher, Margaery, who is only too happy to hand it over.

Sansa glances over at him, sees him watching her, goes bright red, and turns hurriedly back to Margaery.

 _Great_ , he thinks, she purposefully switched slips so she can attend, too, probably out of some misguided duty to keep him company so he doesn’t get _lonely_ or something ridiculous like that. The woman seems incapable of understanding that maybe he likes being by himself.

A sudden thought strikes him with horror. What if she expects him to dance with her? It was not unknown for teachers to boogie down when inspired by the low lighting and frisky music.

 _Nope_ , he affirms to himself, he won’t set foot in the gym unless absolutely necessary. He’ll stick to the usual spots the kids use for clandestine gropings, and then he’ll escape. _There, it_ _’s settled._

…or is it?

The evening of the prom is a gorgeous, clear night, falling fortuitously on a full moon. Sandor leaves his car, tie in hand because he hates wearing them and will only put it on at the last minute, and walks toward the school while buttoning his shirt’s last button at the throat.

Grey suit, light blue shirt, dark blue tie. He’s done extensive research and found that this color combination makes him almost unnoticeable. He’ll never be entirely low-key because of his height and build, but being able to slink back in the shadows and avoid attention, especially at these hideously unpleasant events, makes it at least bearable.

He loops the tie around his neck and tucks it under his collar, then looks down to mangle it into his usual four-in-hand knot. When he looks up again, Sansa is standing about 20 feet away from him. She’s almost painfully beautiful in a little sleeveless number, silvery lace over a dark blue sheath. Her hair is up in a bafflingly complicated arrangement, and little sparkly pins have been stuck in it so she looks like there are stars tucked into the bright waves.

Like usual, she is smiling at him.

Sandor’s breath whooshes out of him. This is going to be torture. She has the look of a woman who expects to spend the entire evening with her swain, and he has a sinking feeling that he himself is the man she has chosen for the role.

Sansa approaches him on five-inch blue stilettos, is draped about the elbows with a fuzzy silver and blue shawl that might have been crocheted from kitten fur, and eyes him from head to toe.

“Can I help you with your tie?” she asks. “It’s kind of…”

He knows it's wonky. With a sigh, he nods, and she reaches up with unseemly glee to set him to rights. After undoing the four-in-hand, she sets about weaving him into the tie in such a way that he wonders if he’ll need to cut himself out of it with scissors at the end of the night.

“A four-in-hand is a small knot, and uneven,” she says conversationally as she works. “Its smaller scale is fine for shorter men, and the unevenness is a good match if you’re rakish, but…”

Sansa bites her lip as she executes a particularly complex maneuver, then smiles when she meets with success.

“…but you’re a big guy, and ‘rakish’ is not exactly an adjective I’d use to describe you.” She darts a quicksilver grin up at him. “So a full-Windsor, with its large and even knot, is more in scale with your…”

“Lumbering hugeness and boring personality?” he finishes with a wry twist to his mouth.

“I was going to say ‘substantial form’ and ‘solid character’,” she replies in a gently chastising tone, a touch of primness about her glossy pink lips.

When she is done, she straightens his collar and flattens his lapels.

“There,” she murmurs, “you look very handsome.”

Hands still resting lightly on his chest, she looks up at him, so close it would only take the merest tilt of his head to meet her lips with his. And oh, how he wants to.

Sandor feels like he’s drowning. Whether in her eyes or a situation for which he is completely unprepared, he can’t tell.

“I know what I look like,” he says, and steps back to sever their contact. He doesn’t mind the scar so much as the contortions people go through to pretend it doesn’t exist.

“I didn’t mean to—” She frowns. Even her frowns are appealing, make him want to smooth out the crease between her auburn brows with a kiss.

Sandor feels a splinter of unhappiness through his belly. She is nuts for taking her gratitude this far, and things are getting too confused in his head. First she spends the year feeding him and bundling him up warmly, fussing over his health and comfort like she _cares_ about him. And now she’s at this stupid fucking dance looking like a princess, standing in the atrium like she’s been waiting for him, even wearing the same colors as he, as if they were a coordinated couple attending together.

 _She is not for you,_ he tells himself fiercely. He’ll never learn, will he?

Good things are not for him. A beautiful woman is not for him. Love is not for him.

“Thanks. For the tie. See you around.” He steps back again, then turns on his heel and walks away. Her hurt is almost palpable as he makes for the gym.

Sandor endures the opening comments and Tyrion’s admonishments, which will go largely unheeded, to keep out of shadowy corners and refrain from spiking the punch. He is exquisitely aware of Sansa standing across the gym. He chances a glimpse at her and, yes, she is watching him, the light in her dimmed. She seems… sad.

He has done that to her, he realizes with no small amount of self-loathing. He has made this lovely girl sad because he is hateful and broken.

 _Better for her to learn it sooner rather than later,_ he thinks savagely. He always disappoints everyone, eventually.

By the end of the night, Sandor has caught thirteen couples engaged in illicit nooky, and Sansa has danced with six students and four teachers. He knows because he counted, feeling scoured with jealousy when someone else’s arms are around her, even in the strictly appropriate way she permits her partners to touch her.

“You seem even more dour than usual, Clegane,” says a voice from waist-level, and Sandor looks down to find his principal standing there looking rather like a pimp in a pinstriped three-piece suit complete with pocket watch, its chain a bright gleam of gold across the expanse of his chest. Knowing Tyrion, he has gone for that impression on purpose.

Sandor only grunts in response, which seems to be all that Tyrion expects.

“Well, summer is almost upon us. You’ll have two whole months to recuperate before having to drag your happy ass back in here in the fall.”

“Going to transfer to King’s Landing South,” Sandor says, giving voice to the idea he’s been considering for a while, and which has solidified over the course of the evening after leaving Sansa in the atrium. He isn’t going to be able to make it through another whole year of her; he’ll barely scrape through the month of June as it is.

A gasp, and then a clatter and splash. Sandor and Tyrion spin around to see Sansa just behind them, hunkered down with a wad of napkins, trying to mop up a spill of obscenely red punch meandering lazily across the shiny wooden floor of the gym.

Her blue, blue eyes meet Sandor’s, and he knows she has overheard him, and that was why she’d dropped her drink.

“Is this over yet?” he grits out. “Can I go now?”

Tyrion’s keen gaze rakes over him. “Yes, go,” he replies shortly. “You’re not really fit company tonight, are you?”

“Am I ever?” Sandor mutters, and stalks off.

He walks through the balmy night to his car, the full moon rendering the sky a sort of permanent twilight. It is horribly romantic, and when he gets behind the steering wheel he slams his fist into the dashboard, just once, but hard enough to cause an ominous cracking sound.

Once home, he begins to unstrap himself from the hated tie, but stops, staring in the mirror for a long moment. Sansa is right, he realizes; he’s too large for a small knot, and too stoic for a jaunty, uneven one. It was her little hands that fashioned it, her big heart that cared enough to fix it. He ends up just loosening the tie enough to slip over his head. Tightening it carefully, he hangs it from one of his coat rack’s arms, right by the door, where he can see it easily and think of her.

When he arrives at school on Monday, it seems that Sandor has finally gotten through to Sansa, because she isn’t parked near him, and in fact seems to have already gone in long before he gets there, so he walks in alone.

At lunch, she doesn’t make an appearance in the cafeteria, but Margaery is there, sitting at the other end of the teachers’ table and shooting him glances even more unfriendly than her usual. Sandor eats his shitty lunch and spends the rest of the half-hour pretending to grade papers.

When he leaves that afternoon, Sansa’s voice comes from around the corner and stops him dead in his tracks. He hasn’t seen her all day and it feels like it’s been weeks instead of just a few hours. She reaches the corner with the Westerosi history teacher, Brienne; she sees him and takes in a shuddering breath before offering him a neutral twitch of the lips instead of the radiant smile she usually gifts him with.

He nods, pretending that he doesn’t feel like she just stabbed him, and walks on.

By the end of the week, he can no longer pretend he doesn’t hear the whispers or see the curious looks. People have noticed that his pretty little shadow is no longer following him; they’ve observed how he now sits alone at lunch and walks around by himself.

The next week, while prowling down the hallway, Sandor hears a girl telling her friend, “There’s no way we can sing this song at graduation. It’s too sad. When she said we were scheduled to perform, I figured she’d arrange something upbeat and inspirational, you know?” The girl sighs. “But Principal Lannister is going to shit if we sing this.”

She looks up, then, and sees Sandor approaching. She scowls at him, practically hissing as he walks past her. He ignores her and keep going, even as his brain tries (and fails) to process what he has overheard.

The week after that, during the study hall he presides over, he overhears two students yapping away in Italian, and grits his teeth because Italian reminds him of Sansa.

“I don’t understand why she’s having us translate this depressing crap,” complains one of the students after a few minutes. “All year long she gives us fun, happy poems, and now at the end we get this mess?”

By the last week of the year, Sandor is back to sleeping like shit and feeling sluggish. And there is this nagging ache in the center of his chest that nothing seems to make go away.

The day before graduation, Margaery and Brienne are in the teacher’s lounge discussing how poorly Sansa has looked recently. Since Sandor has been avoiding her studiously, he hasn’t seen her since that Monday after the prom. He just keeps grading exams and trying to ignore them. It isn’t going well.

“She looks exhausted,” Margaery says flatly. “There are circles under her eyes, and she’s pale as a ghost.” She looks right at him, then, in blatant hostility.

“Hasn’t been eating, either,” comments Brienne, and blinks owlishly in his direction. “I can tell that she’s lost weight.” Then it’s her turn to stare at him, in her usual calm manner, but there is something reproachful about it.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Sandor grumbles. “If you have something to say, just fucking say it.”

It is exactly the overture they need.

“It’s bad enough that Sansa’s in love with an asshole like you,” Margaery says hotly, “but if you weren’t interested, you didn’t have to reject her so cruelly.”

Sandor barely heard the last part of what she’d said; his brain had frozen after the first part and was stuttering in his skull on repeat.

“ _What did you say?”_

Margaery huffs. “That you didn’t have to be so cruel.”

“ _No_. The first part.”

“That’s it’s bad enough she’s in love with you—” she stops, then, because all the blood has drained from his head and he probably looks like he is seconds from passing out. He can feel himself sway in his seat and places his palms flat on the table to steady himself.

“You didn’t know?” asks Brienne quietly.

He just stares helplessly, unable to find any words to say back to her.

“Really? You _really_ didn’t know?” Margaery gapes at him. “You’re a dick, but I always thought you were at least a _smart_ dick. How could you not tell? Everyone in school knows.”

“Everyone?” he forces through stiff lips.

“ _Everyone_ ,” she affirms. “Teachers, students, janitors, landscapers. Even the school mascot knows.”

The school mascot is a heavily medicated geriatric lion, so Sandor doubts the poor thing knows much of anything, but that is besides the point.

“Honestly, Clegane, what did you think she was _doing_ with you all year?” Brienne, as ever, is a voice of reason. “Giving you presents, attending all the football games, spending as much time with you as possible…”

“The food!” Margaery explodes. “She spends all her free time either cooking for you, or planning and shopping what to cook for you. Are you really so stupid you thought she was doing it, what, out of the goodness of her heart?”

“I thought… she was grateful. For getting those boys off her, the first day of school.” His head is whirling in shock. He thinks a click might have sounded from behind him, but he can’t tell for sure, and doesn’t care. “And that she felt bad for me being by myself so much. She seems like a hopeless do-gooder.” Her kindness is one of the things he finds so irresistible about her.

“Is it so hard to believe she might care for you? Might want to spend time with you?” Brienne asks.

“No one else ever has.” Sandor usually wouldn’t have been so candid, especially about this most vulnerable of topics, but his faculties have gone begging. He is in no condition to pick and choose his words just then.

Margaery and Brienne exchange a glance that is fraught with sympathy.

“Maybe if you weren’t such a douchebag all the time…” Margaery says sulkily, soon quieted by Brienne’s elbow nudged into her ribs. She seems highly put out that Sandor’s situation is too tragic to continue to mock.

“Do you return her feelings?” Brienne ask.

“I’m not good enough for her.”

“No argument from me,” grumbles Margaery.

“That doesn’t sound like ‘no’,” Brienne says with a little smile. “Do you care for her?”

“I love her.” The words tumble out of him, a dam bursting free, a force too mighty to hold back.

Her smile widens, and she collects her things and stands up. A second later, after a pointed look from Brienne, Margaery does the same.

“Then you should tell her,” Brienne says, and nods to something behind him.

Sandor stands and turns around. Sansa is behind him, looking as drawn and pale as they have said, her dress hanging off her frame where a month ago it would have lovingly caressed her shapely form.

Brienne and Margaery clear out of the lounge; he scarcely sees them go, his entire focus on Sansa.

When they were alone, she says, “Why, Sandor?”

He knew what she was asking. “I didn’t know. I didn’t— I thought you were only thanking me for helping you that first day. Or that you were just pitying me.” He takes a deep breath. “I didn’t think it was possible— that you could _ever_ —”

“From the very beginning,” she interrupts, but gently. “From that first day. And after that, I watched you. I saw how perceptive you are. I saw how you took on jobs no one else had time for. I saw how good you are with the students, and how much they respect your honesty. You’re kind, in your own gruff way. And I could see how lonely you are, how used you are to being by yourself. I was hoping… I thought giving you time, letting you get used to the idea of being loved and taken care of, rather than springing it on you…”

“Sansa,” he rasps. Sandor takes a step toward her, then stops, still unsure he might have the right to touch her.

She smiles at him, and the light is back in her face. She slides her arms around him and presses her face to his chest. His arms come up to hold her, almost convulsively. The bell rings to change periods; still they stand there. Out in the hallway, footsteps and chatter rise and fall as people pass by the door. Still they stand there.

“There’s just one more period,” Sansa mumbles into his shirt eventually. “The last class of the year. Let’s go wrap everything up and meet up in the parking lot.” She blushes faintly. “I parked by you again today.”

“Did you? I didn’t see your car.”

“You were looking?” At his hum of confirmation, she smiles into his shirt. “I moved it there after you went inside.”

His arms tighten around her. Then his stomach growls.

“I haven’t been eating well, the past few weeks,” he says, feeling a little bashful.

“I know a way to fix that.” She tilts her head back, then stands on her tiptoes and presses her mouth to his.

Their first kiss is gentle and chaste, lips remaining closed, very little saliva involved at all. Still, it feels like a promise has been made and accepted.

“We can go shopping,” he says when she pulls away.

“And then back to your place to cook dinner,” she adds.

“I don’t have much to cook with. Your place would be better. You have pots and… spoons and… things.”

Sansa laughs. “Yes, I have pots and spoons and things.” She tsks. “You don’t even have spoons? I can see you need a keeper. Someone has to take care of you.”

“Yes,” he agrees instantly. “Know anyone who’s up for the job?”

“I might. But she’s verrrrrrry expensive.”

“Oh? How much does she cost?”

“The price is one heart, non-negotiable, payment upon delivery.”

“What if she already has it?”

Her smile is radiant, glowing. Sansa _shines_ up at him, like he holds a star in his arms.

“Then it’s all settled. I just have to give you a receipt.”

She kisses him again, but this kiss is anything _but_ chaste. There is tongue, and some moaning, and various body parts perking up.

When they pull away, they are shocked from their reverie of staring rather stupidly at each other by an outbreak of applause. Jerking apart, they turn to find Tyrion standing in the doorway, barely able to hold back the press of students peering over him.

“When you two didn’t show up for your classes, there was some concern. I’m glad we found you being completely inappropriate in the lounge instead of lying dead in the parking lot,” Tyrion comments acidly.

“They could have eloped,” says one girl from Sansa’s choir, sighing at the romantic prospect.

“Or just been banging each other in the stairwell,” says one of Sandor’s football players, to the disgusted groans of those around him. A couple had gotten caught doing that— by Sandor himself, to his distress, earlier in the year— and it is still fresh in everyone’s minds.

“Yes, well, fortunately they only made a spectacle of themselves during school hours.” Tyrion starts shooing the students away. “Everyone go back to your classrooms, your teachers will be there soon.”

This last is delivered from below eyebrows drawn ominously together in a frightful scowl as he turns back to them. “Fix your personal problems on your own time. We’ve only got one more day to get through. Don’t fuck this up.”

“We won’t,” Sansa promises, but Sandor is pretty sure she’s talking about more than just surviving the last day of school.

“We won’t,” he agrees.

They separate at last, going to their respective classes. There is no point in teaching anything, and Sandor couldn’t have cared less, so he just sits at his desk and stares out the window, still in shock. A few of his students try to talk to him, but give up when they receive no response.

Finally, finally, the last bell rings. A cheer goes up from the students, echoing in every other classroom in the school, and Sandor waits out the stampede as everyone flees. He gets his messenger bag and walks out to the parking lot to find Sansa leaving from another exit and approaching him on an intercept course.

“I remembered that I have an eggplant parmigiana in the freezer,” she says without preamble. “So we don’t have to go shopping, just throw it in the oven for a few hours and it’ll be good to go.”

They walk to their cars.

“Oh? What will we do with all that spare time, then?” he asks her.

Her grin is wide and very, very naughty. “I’m sure we can think of something.”

And they do.

Oh, yes, they do. 

**Author's Note:**

> Trovommi Amor del tutto disarmato  
> et aperta la via per gli occhi al cuore,  
> che di lagrime son fatti uscio et varco:  
> Però al mio parer non li fu honore  
> ferir me de saetta in quello stato,  
> a voi armata non mostrar pur l'arco.  
>  
> 
> Love found me completely vulnerable  
> and found the way to my heart through my eyes,  
> which have become the halls and doors of tears:  
> It seems to me it honored Love very little  
> to wound me with his arrow in my state  
> but to you, protected, he did not even show his bow.


End file.
